Book I (part 3)

When the seasonal rains are coming down, if we still keep watering the ground, will not our toil be labour lost for all the good it will do? Do you, Master, stand forth (as sovereign), and the kingdom will (at once) be well governed. If I still (continue to) preside over it, I must look on myself as vainly occupying the place;--I beg to resign the throne to you.' Hsü p. 170 [paragraph continues] Yû said, 'You, Sir, govern the kingdom, and the kingdom is well governed. If I in these circumstances take your place, shall I not be doing so for the sake of the name? But the name is but the guest of the reality;--shall I be playing the part of the guest? The tailor-bird makes its nest in the deep forest, but only uses a single branch; the mole 1 drinks from the Ho, but only takes what fills its belly. Return and rest in being ruler,--I will have nothing to do with the throne. Though the cook were not attending to his kitchen, the representative of the dead and the officer of prayer would not leave their cups and stands to take his place.' 5. Kien Wû 2 asked Lien Shû 2 , saying, 'I heard Khieh-yû 3 talking words which were great, but had nothing corresponding to them (in reality);-once gone, they could not be brought back. I was frightened by them;--they were like the Milky Way 4 which cannot be traced to its beginning or end. They had no connexion with one another, and were not akin to the experiences of men.' 'What were his words?' asked Lien Shift, and the other replied, (He said) that 'Far away on the hill of Kû-shih 5 there dwelt a Spirit-like man whose flesh and skin p. 171 were (smooth) as ice and (white) as snow; that his manner was elegant and delicate as that of a virgin; that he did not eat any of the five grains, but inhaled the wind and drank the dew; that he mounted on the clouds, drove along the flying dragons, rambling and enjoying himself beyond the four seas; that by the concentration of his spirit-like powers he could save men from disease and pestilence, and secure every year a plentiful harvest.' These words appeared to me wild and incoherent and I did not believe them. 'So it is,' said Lien Shû. 'The blind have no perception of the beauty of elegant figures, nor the deaf of the sound of bells and drums. But is it only the bodily senses of which deafness and blindness can be predicated? There is also a similar defect in the intelligence; and of this your words supply an illustration in yourself. That man, with those attributes, though all things were one mass of confusion, and he heard in that condition the whole world crying out to him to be rectified, would not have to address himself laboriously to the task, as if it were his business to rectify the world. Nothing could hurt that man; the greatest floods, reaching to the sky, could not drown him, nor would he feel the fervour of the greatest heats melting metals and stones till they flowed, and scorching all the ground and hills. From the dust and chaff of himself, he could still mould and fashion Yâos and Shuns 1 ;how should he be willing to occupy himself with things 2 ?' p. 172 6. A man of Sung, who dealt in the ceremonial caps (of Yin) 1 , went with them to Yüeh 2 , the people of which cut off their hair and tattooed their bodies, so that they had no use for them.